You have solved a problem for me. My nephew is getting married. He and his fiance are going to have a Scottish wedding at a Victorian Mansion. Their ancient wood sgian dubh is a perfect personal gift for him. Not a bad price at all either.

Glad I could help, Drlee.

"Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies." - Marx (Groucho)

Tainari88 wrote:What is a 'damp squib''? I have no idea. Did they find a nicer life?

In my experience (and I have a lot of experience working with immigrants) the immigrants rarely find a nicer life. Just a life in which they get stuck with working for bad wages and hoping their kids make a better life and often the first generations do ok....but the second ones wind up not doing well if the income is not good and education is expensive.

One should have a very strong reason to immigrate. Like I had. Out of the USA. Permanently.

Many people have false ideas of what to expect in these supposedly 'looking for a nicer life' reasons.

Not anymore. If you don't have some massive education credentials or experience, and or speak English extremely well and have a very well laid out plan on how you are going to become a doctor, lawyer, engineer, dentist, etc profession? And you don't have wealthy parents sponsoring your career? Most likely you won't be having a much improved lifestyle.

No, they found money and tonnes of it on one side of the family (highly educated and supposed 'high IQs' whatever that means) the other side found armed (and one armed, in the case of an uncle!) robbery & criminality instead..

Money is worthless if you don't share it and, well, they're greedy. They've traded paradise on gleaming beaches in the 'tropics' for the western rat race and greed...

It's a shame really, but I guess everything happens for a reason.

I'd rather be poor and better natured, rather than be greedy, nasty and rich. They're not mutually incompatible and some of the nicest people I've ever met are rich, but you know how it is..

Presvias wrote:I'd rather be poor and better natured, rather than be greedy, nasty and rich. They're not mutually incompatible and some of the nicest people I've ever met are rich, but you know how it is..

I have a friend who came here from Australia, where he was an attorney. He got here with around $6,000 in his pocket. He and a friend started an online sandwich delivery service in the financial district in San Francisco. He's now an American citizen, living in Las Vegas, with a net worth of around $60 million. He is an absolute sweetheart of a guy.

Some years back, a bunch of us were friends on a guitar forum. We'd been on that forum for years and struck up great friendships; well, as great as the internet would allow. Some of us had met in real life, but not all, although we'd always talked about it. That all changed when one of us, an older guy down in Melbourne, Australia was diagnosed with cancer. Pete paid for 11 of us to fly, first class, to Melbourne from our home cities, and also covered the cost of our hotel rooms. He said he didn't like to think that Bat, the gentleman with cancer, would never get to meet any of us. He absolutely refused repayment.

Pete is probably the single nicest guy I've ever known, and certainly one of the richest...

Courage is knowing that something will hurt and doing it anyway. Stupidity is the same thing. That's why life is hard...

I used to collect guitars; mostly vintage. That got a bit spendy and, frankly, took up a lot of room. I was up to 37 at one point, along with about a dozen amplifiers. All of the vintage ones have been sold off. I now own only two guitars (one electric and one acoustic) and I'm quite happy with those.

I then got into watches and, to some degree, I still enjoy them. And, while I own several "luxury" brands, my favorite "daily wear" watches are by a company called Deep Blue; good, solid tool watches for a few hundred bucks. I also have some vintage pieces which belonged to my grandfather, my Dad and my step-Dad.

At the moment I actively collect two things. First are vintage cameras. Most are old Kodak bellows cameras, but I've got a few vintage 120 and 35mm camera, as well. For my birthday last year a buddy gave me a 110 Instamatic, with the original box, flash cube and instructions, and it's in pristine condition. I scour local thrift stores and online sale sites and am always amazed at what people think these are worth. More often than not, people ask way too much for what they have, believing that if something is old it must be valuable. Not the case with old cameras.

Also, as a photographer, and aside from their cameras, I collect almost anything Kodak. I've got a number of Nascar pieces (which are far and away the easiest to find) of various scale, but also race boats, tractor trailers and motorhomes. The latest edition is a British piece; a 1959 Morris delivery van in Kodak livery. One of these days I'm going to photograph the collection.

Howsaboutyou?

I have about 30 guitars. I stopped buying a few years ago. Not sure what to do with them since i don't get to play them all. Guitars need to be played otherwise they seem to need a set up. Luckily I do my own. I find myself maintaining guitars rather than playing them. In the end I enjoy the most the guitars I put together form parts.

Julian658 wrote:I have about 30 guitars. I stopped buying a few years ago. Not sure what to do with them since i don't get to play them all. Guitars need to be played otherwise they seem to need a set up. Luckily I do my own. I find myself maintaining guitars rather than playing them. In the end I enjoy the most the guitars I put together form parts.

What do you have? More electric or acoustic?

Two of my prized pieces were a 1935 Martin D-18 and a 1954 Fender Stratocaster. I sold them a few years back to finance a motorcycle build.

If you maintain proper humidity and temperature (50-55% humidity at 70 degrees is just about perfect for acoustic guitars), you shouldn't really have to do much to them in the way of set ups. Changing string gauges is usually when I would have to do mine.

I'm currently on the hunt for a Gibson J-200. I don't even really play much anymore, but I'm smitten by that guitar. A friend of mine here in town has an older one, but she's not letting it go!

Courage is knowing that something will hurt and doing it anyway. Stupidity is the same thing. That's why life is hard...

Two of my prized pieces were a 1935 Martin D-18 and a 1954 Fender Stratocaster. I sold them a few years back to finance a motorcycle build.

If you maintain proper humidity and temperature (50-55% humidity at 70 degrees is just about perfect for acoustic guitars), you shouldn't really have to do much to them in the way of set ups. Changing string gauges is usually when I would have to do mine.

I'm currently on the hunt for a Gibson J-200. I don't even really play much anymore, but I'm smitten by that guitar. A friend of mine here in town has an older one, but she's not letting it go!

I don't have old collector type guitars. I just have a bunch of Gibson, Gretsch, Danelectro, Rickenbacker, Guild guitars. I also have Tele and Strat type guitars I put together. I do not have a real Fender. I also have a few cheap guitars that I actually like a lot like an Agile Harm.

I also have a couple of nylon acoustics. At most I would like a new modern nylon guitar with a thinner neck to play jazzy stuff.

BigSteve wrote:Taylor makes some nice nylon string guitars. They're nylon string guitars for people who usually play steel string...

Exactly! I tried a few the other day, but Guitar Center did not have many in stock. I may also go for a modern flamenco type nylon because they have lower action than conventional classic guitars. However, I could always lower the action. I tend to like the brightness of a flamenco guitar a bit more.

I never had a great steel string acoustic. I have a J160E Gibson that sounds average. I purchased in 1992 because it was a Beatle guitar. My other acoustics are Guild and Yamaha; never had a Martin.

I have a Gibson Les Paul, but I have another Agile I like a bit more. My big problem with guitars is that I never stay with one style. I tend to prefer single coils, but then I crave the fuller sound of humbuckers. Sometimes I want to play surf music for a few weeks and then get bored and want to learn jazz tunes. I am not focused on a particular style.

As for acoustic guitar my favorite is the sound of James Taylor. He is an underrated player.

I also write and record my own compositions, but now that I am older the creativity is not what it used to be. Now I understand why the music I love the best was written by the artists in their 20s. When I was 20 I could write and record three songs in one night. Now one tune takes a month. I assume there are just to many options (paralysis by analysis).

BigSteve wrote:I have a friend who came here from Australia, where he was an attorney. He got here with around $6,000 in his pocket. He and a friend started an online sandwich delivery service in the financial district in San Francisco. He's now an American citizen, living in Las Vegas, with a net worth of around $60 million. He is an absolute sweetheart of a guy.

Some years back, a bunch of us were friends on a guitar forum. We'd been on that forum for years and struck up great friendships; well, as great as the internet would allow. Some of us had met in real life, but not all, although we'd always talked about it. That all changed when one of us, an older guy down in Melbourne, Australia was diagnosed with cancer. Pete paid for 11 of us to fly, first class, to Melbourne from our home cities, and also covered the cost of our hotel rooms. He said he didn't like to think that Bat, the gentleman with cancer, would never get to meet any of us. He absolutely refused repayment.

Pete is probably the single nicest guy I've ever known, and certainly one of the richest...

Julian658 wrote:I never had a great steel string acoustic. I have a J160E Gibson that sounds average. I purchased in 1992 because it was a Beatle guitar. My other acoustics are Guild and Yamaha; never had a Martin.

Back in 1987 I traded a Gibson Blue Ridge, which had a twisted neck, for a 1986 Alvarez-Yairi DY-66 which was in pristine condition. It's now far from pristine, but it's the finest playing and sounding acoustic guitar I've ever owned (and I've owned a lot). I've put every scratch, dent, ding, scrape and crack on this thing. It's been on fire, it's been in a flood, it's fallen down a flight of stairs and it's been hit by a car. I can't kill it.

It won't let me:

I don't necessarily have the best strumming technique!

I also had a Martin D-40 which, unfortunately, I had to sell some years back when things got a bit lean. I'm actively looking for a replacement for it. Such a great guitar:

They were only made for a few years, and they're difficult to find.

Finally, there's Excalibur, my 1990 Fender American Standard Stratocaster. It was the first American made Strat I've ever owned. I've changed the plastic parts and swapped out the original pickups to Lace Sensors:

My daughter has instructions to bury me with the Yairi, but I know she's gonna' snag it and probably slip an Esteban into the casket with me instead...

Courage is knowing that something will hurt and doing it anyway. Stupidity is the same thing. That's why life is hard...

I used to be very active in the vintage guitar market. I've sold them all off, though, to folks who might appreciate them more.

I collect watches, although not actively. If I find something I like, I'll buy it, but I never really go out with the intent of buying a watch.

My Aunt passed away in 2018, and as a result I guess it could be said that I collect early American silver coins. She left about $4,000 worth of them (at face value). I go through them little by little and, while most of them are quite worn and probably not worth more than their melt value, there are some that are in fine condition and are worth a few bucks.

One such coin is this 1870 seated Liberty quarter. In this condition I'm finding prices anywhere between $140 and $550:

There are a lot of coins to go through, but I suspect they'll add up to a tidy little sum...

I collect old cameras. I've got a couple of cool ones, as well as a really cool home developing kit. I don't think I'll be giving it a whirl anytime soon, but I've never seen one before. I've also got an old Kodak darkroom timer from the 1950's. I thought about doing a cosmetic restoration to it (it's mechanically sound), but ultimately decided against it:

I also collect old radios. I recently bought one that's identical to the one that sat on our kitchen counter when I was a kid. It's the one we'd glue our ears to when waiting to hear if school was cancelled when it snowed. I gave it to my Mom (she's in her mid '80s and sharp as a tack) and she loves it. It's only AM, though.

I've always thought of art deco to be more associated with the 1920's and 30's as opposed to the 80's.

Yeah, Art Deco is 20s and 30s, maybe a little earlier. These are just cheap knockoffs of that style. They really are nothing special, while they were sold in expensive shops, a lot of them are already showing wear and tear, and I don't abuse them.

I may start posting pics in the Spring. I also visit a cycling forum. After I throw on some crazy new handlebars and fenders on my bike, I want to post a pic of it there. But I am really old, and find computer stuff annoying. Hopefully picture hosting hasn't changed much.

Back in the 50's and 60's, supper clubs were popular; where you could go have a good meal and see a show. The menus from some of these places are sort of cool, and the prices on them are ridiculous. A Filet Mignon for $2.00? Lobster for $2.25? The fonts and illustrations (usually of the establishment and rarely of the food) they use on the menus are very "kitschy".

Along with the old menus, I have these things called "needle cards". They were made available at discount stores and such and, as their name would suggest, they hold a lot of different size needles. They're not quite art-deco, but their designs do hearken back to a time when advertising was viewed very differently than it is in the digital world of today.

I also have a lot of old matchbooks from the 50's through the 90's.

I don't know why I collect any of these things. I don't display them. Some of the stuff could look good framed, though.